


star-crossed

by tokkias



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Post-Canon, Sad with a Happy Ending, Simulation AU, maki and kaito have a mutual existential crisis and it's just all around a bad time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:06:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26722621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tokkias/pseuds/tokkias
Summary: Their love wasn't written in the stars, merely written down on a storyboard.
Relationships: Harukawa Maki/Momota Kaito
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31





	star-crossed

Maki hated her scars. They were a reminder that she wasn’t real, permanently etched into her skin. She remembered the origin of every single one, of every single near death experience, of every almost-failed mission, and yet none of that was real, every scar was just a memory implanted in her mind by Team Danganronpa. But she just like everything else about her life before Danganronpa, she had no memory of how she got those scars. She often wondered if they had given her these scars for the sole purpose of giving her the “look” of the Ultimate Assassin. Had she had these prior to Danganronpa, or were they just another part of her character? Sometimes she wanted to give herself new scars, to feel something, to differentiate herself from the character they had written. Those nights, Kaito would pry the knife from her hands and pull her back to bed, where she would cling to him and sob until her waking nightmares just turned into regular ones. Other nights they would be fortunate enough to skip straight to the tears, Maki heaving and sobbing into Kaito’s shirt well into the night. 

Kaito had his share of unhealthy coping mechanisms too. Maki can’t stand the stench of alcohol, but she can’t blame him for it either, because she partakes in it too. Some nights being drunk is better than any other alternative. 

They’re codependent in the least healthy way. He can’t be in a room not knowing where she is. He’s not sure what he’s afraid of, really. Maybe that she’ll be whisked away by Team Danganronpa again and forced to live through hell for the entertainment of a sick and twisted audience. He thinks that if he’s always there he can protect her, have them take him instead, because no one deserves to go through that, least of all his Maki. 

The nights were always the hardest. There was nothing to distract them at night. Often Kaito would try to seek comfort in the stars and their stories, scattered across the night sky, but they did little more than remind him that all those nights stargazing with his grandfather were nothing more than fictitious memories. He so desperately wanted to bring Maki home to meet his grandparents. They’d shower her with the familial love and affection she never got as a child, but so desperately needed. For the first time she’d have a family, one who’d take care of her and love her unconditionally. But there was no home, no grandparents, no family. Nothing. If he had any family prior to Danganronpa, he didn’t remember them, and it’s not like they had made an effort to reach out to him either. The only friends and family he had now were Maki, Shuichi, and the rest of the killing game participants. 

Nights weren’t easy for Maki either. Sleep didn’t come for her easily after the killing game, in fact, she actively tried to evade it. Being left with her own thoughts wasn’t ideal, but at least when she was awake she was at least somewhat in control of the images her mind would conjure. Of course, she couldn’t stay awake forever, and she couldn’t avoid whatever nightmares the night would bring her either. 

She hated it. 

That dream.

Over and over.

She had never wanted to relive that moment, seeing Kaito’s body laying there, limp and lifeless.

Every single night, she would lose him again. And all she could do was scream and cry and beg for him to come back to her. Every single night was just as vivid and real as his execution. Her distressed sobs would rouse Kaito from his own nightmares, and he would rub circles into her back, reminding her that he was still here. 

If Kaito had nightmares, he didn’t talk about them, but he didn’t have to for Maki to figure it out. Some nights he would thrash about and call out her name, loud enough to wake her. She would shake him awake, not wanting to let him keep agonising through the torture his brain put him through. Maki was never as good at comfort as Kaito was, so on those nights all she could do was hold him and tell him that they would be okay. It was one of those nights when she first saw him cry. 

She hadn’t seen Kaito cry before, not outright anyway; she could only feel his uneven breaths when he held her when she cried. She couldn’t blame him if he did cry, but Kaito wasn’t the type of person who cried in front of others, or at least, the character Kaito wasn’t. Maki had struggled to come to terms with the fact that this Kaito, the one she had fallen in love with was nothing more than a character, almost as much as she had struggled with her own identity. They weren’t the star crossed lovers that she had thought they were, they were just two dumb teenagers who signed up for a killing game and were unlucky enough to fall in love . Their love wasn’t written in the stars, merely sketched onto a storyboard and broadcasted to the world to sell a few more pieces of merchandise. There was always a fear lingering in the back of Maki’s head, that maybe their love was performative, a remnant of their time as the tragic lovers of season 53. But she would remind herself that there was no audience watching them anymore, no one to witness her break down in tears over what Team Danganronpa had done to them, no one to feel guilty for finding pleasure in their pain.

And no one to see the softness between them either. How he’d wipe away her tears after a particularly hard night, or trace the scars on her skin until he allowed sleep to overcome him. How she would lay in his arms, reassure him that she wasn’t going anywhere. 

Sometimes when the nights weren’t so hard, they’d hold each other, not out of fear, but simply because they wanted to. Because despite everything they were still in love. On those nights they would smile, and fall in love all over again. 

Love wouldn’t cure all, but maybe it was better than going through it alone.

**Author's Note:**

> started making it, had a breakdown, bon appetit


End file.
